A research team looked specifically at how sugar intake affects the way in which mammary gland tumors transpire in mice, feeding different groups one of four diets. One of those diets was high in sucrose, and that group had a startling 50 to 58 percent rate of developing mammary tumors.

It should also be mentioned that the sucrose-enriched diet was made similar to the sugar-laden Western diet the majority of us follow each and every day.

"We determined that it was specifically fructose, in table sugar and high-fructose corn syrup, ubiquitous within our food system, which was responsible for facilitating lung metastasis and 12-HETE production in breast tumors," study co-author Lorenzo Cohen, PhD, notes in the research.

So, what does this mean for you? Considering the U.S. Health and Human Services and USDA just released new nutritional guidelines today recommending limiting added sugar to 10 percent or less of your daily calories, we would start reading those ingredient labels on packaged foods. There is sugar hiding in everything from the pasta sauce you buy to the salad dressing you drizzle over a salad.